Lebanon Mayor Matt Gentry released a statement and update regarding the water situation circulating around Boone County since the announcement of increased amounts of water being needed for expansion projects.
Gentry stated that with increased amounts of discussions and questions regarding Lebanon’s current and future water supply on social media, he sought to explain his viewpoint on the matter, releasing the following:
1) Lebanon is not out of water. Our current maximum supply is 4.6 Million Gallons per Day (MGD). We divide this amount by a peaking factor of 1.46 (ratio of maximum flow to the average daily flow in our system) and then by 500 gallons per day per EDU (equivalent dwelling unit). This creates 6,301 current EDUs in our system. Our utilities then allocate these EDUs to customers based on availability fees being paid to secure the water. If you are currently a Lebanon Utilities water customer, your availability fees have already been paid and “your” water is accounted for in our system. We do this to ensure that there will never be a situation where someone turns on a faucet and no water comes out. Water is not secured until availability fees have been paid. Large customers like Lilly paid the applicable availability fees to reserve the water needed for their phase 1 operations. However, since large users such as Lilly are not currently using their full allocation, we are only using about half our maximum supply.
2) We put a moratorium on new developments to protect our current utility customers. With the recent growth in town (residential, commercial, and industrial), we reached our 4.6 MGD cap of allocable water. The moratorium was put in place to ensure that no users (residential, commercial, or industrial) would be put in a situation where they didn’t have access to the water that was promised to them. Several projects were approved and secured water prior to the moratorium, so this is why you are still seeing some projects move forward with construction. Those developments were approved by the City Planning Commission and secured their water by paying the applicable availability fees. Some projects received planning approval but did not pay availability fees so they had not secured water for their project before we hit our 4.6 MGD cap. These projects will not be able to move forward until additional water is available.
3) Lebanon is having ongoing discussions with Citizens Energy Group to purchase wholesale water. Geographically speaking, Lebanon is in a challenging position when it comes to naturally occurring water supply. Our City straddles the White River and Wabash River watersheds. This essentially means that water drains away from us, and we don’t have any major underground aquifers near us. Lebanon needing more water is not new and was not caused by the LEAP district. The majority of our water comes from a well field several miles north of town along Sugar Creek. Lebanon has been actively looking for additional water sources since at least 2006. Several of my predecessor mayors tried to find solutions to this problem. In 2014, Boone County municipalities funded a Water Study to look at the options available to us locally. The study proposed several options including a reservoir north of Lebanon, a new well field near Lafayette (which was also proposed in Indiana’s 2006 Water Shortage Plan https://www.in.gov/dnr/water/water-availability-use-rights/indianas-water-shortage-plan/), and purchasing water from a regional water supplier. The growth coming to Lebanon just based on our proximity to Indianapolis would have put us the need to find more water eventually. The Boone County Water Study projected Lebanon’s need for additional water would occur by 2030 but the LEAP district has moved this timeline forward. At this time, no wholesale agreements have been approved by the Lebanon Utilities Service Board or the Lebanon City Council. The Indiana Finance Authority and Citizens Energy Group’s Board of Directors have taken some recent action that put in place the groundwork and financing needed to bring additional water supply to Lebanon. I am projecting we will have formal actions and votes taken by the Utility Service Board and City Council by late Fall 2024. Any wholesale water agreements would have to be approved by these bodies.
4) Lebanon’s current ratepayers will not have their water rates raised to fund additional water supply to Lebanon. From the very beginning as my time as Mayor, I have been working on bringing additional water to Lebanon in a way that will not impact our current ratepayers. When the Governor and Secretary of Commerce first told me about their idea for the LEAP District on March 1st, 2022; my first concern and question I raised was related to Lebanon’s water supply. They assured me the State would work with us to help bring additional water to Lebanon. Due to the significant levels of new investment being made in the LEAP District and the State’s Innovation Development District law; LEAP users, not the citizens of Lebanon, will fund the construction of the necessary infrastructure to get additional water to Lebanon’s system. The revenues created by Lilly (and future companies in LEAP) will back the necessary financing to construct the water main extensions to Lebanon. We are essentially creating two utility districts (one for LEAP and one for Lebanon prior to LEAP). Only the LEAP utility district is “on the hook” for the financial burden and liability of the new infrastructure. By my direction and design, the Lebanon Utilities and City teams have worked very hard to insulate and protect our current rate payers from any financial risk or impact of LEAP. Because of the LEAP district, we are able to solve a long-time challenge and bringing additional water to Lebanon without Lebanon’s citizens paying for it. This is best possible case scenario for the citizens of Lebanon; which would not have been possible without the LEAP District.
5) Lebanon purchasing water from Citizens Energy is not uncommon. Citizens has about 350,000 direct customers and provides wholesale water service to 8 other communities. This includes communities like Whitestown, Brownsburg, Pittsboro, Lizton, Danville, and several others in the Indianapolis metro area. Citizens’ water system has a maximum capacity of 256 MGD with an average daily demand of 127 MGD. They have the capacity and ability to sell Lebanon additional water.
No further information has been released regarding the acquisition of water for the Lebanon area for future expansion projects as numerous surrounding cities and counties continue to oppose pipeline proposals and aiding in the acquisition of water.
